Why it works: Egg and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 21% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 122,807 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Prune Pudding
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare the fruit
Stew the prunes until soft, then remove the seeds and chop them finely.
Add the sugar to the chopped prunes.
Make the meringue
Beat the egg whites until stiff enough to turn the bowl upside down without spilling.
Gently fold the beaten egg whites into the prunes and sugar mixture.
Bake and serve
Pour the mixture into a dish set in hot water and bake at 400°F (200°C) for 30 minutes.
Serve the pudding hot or cold, with whipped cream, custard, or ice cream dressing.
Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
Explore the science
The flavor team
The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.
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Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together122,807 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Egg whites
- Whipped into a foam that gives the pudding its light, airy structure as it sets.
- Prunes
- Provide the main fruit flavour and moisture, becoming a soft, sweet base for the pudding.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the prune base and helps stabilise the whipped egg white foam.
The step that matters
Folding the beaten egg whites into the prunes. Egg white foam is full of trapped air that gives lift. Folding gently keeps that air in; stirring vigorously deflates the foam and leaves a dense pudding.
“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.
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